Free customers have until May 7 to upgrade to paid service or go somewhere else.

Dyn offers a whole passel of DNS-related products, but the company is most famous for its free DynDNS service: it lets users associate often dynamic IP addresses with hostnames, as long as those users "check in" once a month. It's a boon for people wanting to slap an easily remembered, fully qualified domain name onto their home ISP connections without dropping the money to actually register a domain—and it's vanishing on May 7, 2014.

Dyn CEO Jeremy Hitchcock posted a blog entry yesterday morning explaining the reasoning behind killing off DynDNS' free tier. The language is a little muddled and the post reads like it was run through a corporate communications department before posting, but Hitchcock explains that the move away from free accounts is due to increased abuse and diminishing value for Dyn.

Hitchcock notes that the change will allow Dyn to spend more time refining its paid service offerings and supporting paying customers. Dyn users who had previously donated money to the company in exchange for free lifetime service are exempted from the discontinuation.

This isn't a sudden change for Dyn; the company has been gradually scaling back its free service for years. According to Dyn's transition FAQ page, existing customers have until May 7 to either upgrade to a "Dyn VIP" account (at what Hitchcock describes as a "significant" discount), or allow their service to lapse.

For users who don't want to pay for dynamic DNS services and who will be looking to relocate from Dyn, there are alternatives: Afraid is a popular one, as is NoIP. However, DynDNS is by far the most widely used DDNS service at least in part because it's embedded in many routers' firmware to enable automated DDNS updates—and it's often the only embedded option. For users who depend exclusively on their routers and free DynDNS, it's time to start figuring out how to switch.

Lee Hutchinson
Lee is the Senior Technology Editor at Ars and oversees gadget, automotive, IT, and culture content. He also knows stuff about enterprise storage, security, and manned space flight. Lee is based in Houston, TX. Emaillee.hutchinson@arstechnica.com//Twitter@Lee_Ars

73 Reader Comments

I wish some of the free DNS services out there would emulate DynDNS's API. A simple entries in my router's DNS file could point dnydns.org at another domain, but still utilize the built in hardcoded DynDNS functionality.

Got that email yesterday morning and 10minutes later was up on Afraid. It was pretty clear where Dyn was going, I was just to lazy to fix something that worked. Afraid has a list of many clients that can keep your IP current, no reason to limit yourself to your router.

Wait a minute, look at the bottom of that chart. Isn't any automated service 0% organic? Machines are synthetic... Can't argue about fat free. I always wondered how they made money on this service, now I know they don't.

They've been pushing people away from the free service for years. This is just making it official.

Got tired of the update to continue E-mails, moved on to the plenty of others DDNS services. As for those whose devices are tied to DynDNS, all it takes is one updater on your LAN to keep your Dynamic name current.

Edit: I've been with them even before they were asking for monthly logins.

Wait a minute, look at the bottom of that chart. Isn't any automated service 0% organic? Machines are synthetic... Can't argue about fat free. I always wondered how they made money on this service, now I know they don't.

That bothered my too. My computer is 100% inorganic although I make sure all the electrons are from organic sources.

It's a boon for people wanting to slap an easily remembered, fully qualified domain name onto their home ISP connections without dropping the money to actually register a domain

I thought people needing access to their home computers (which don't have static IPs) for various remote controlled apps was a big driver of the service. I personally used it so I could have a fixed address to use with my torrent remotes and RDP.

I wonder if they will trigger a massive self-inflicited DDOS? What are all of those routers going to do when the service disappears and people don't know how to update them? They probably go into error loops.

For what it's worth, I got an email from Dyn saying that "because you believed in us and supported this company through your donations, we are continuing to fulfill our promise to you: your service is still free for life."

Then again, I've been using them since 1998, back when they were founded, before they were even public (and back when they were just called DynDNS), and I threw them a little donation back then when I was a student. The email said it was for "our longest and most loyal customers."

Personally, I've used dns.he.net, from Hurricane Electric, which is really high-quality.

As I recall, in order to use it, you must have an account with their TunnelBroker.net IPv6 tunnel service. (And, if you find IP networking too confusing to pick up IPv6 in a weekend using their quizzes and examples, then you probably should NOT be managing a DNS zone for your home network!)

Wait a minute, look at the bottom of that chart. Isn't any automated service 0% organic? Machines are synthetic... Can't argue about fat free. I always wondered how they made money on this service, now I know they don't.

That bothered my too. My computer is 100% inorganic although I make sure all the electrons are from organic sources.

From carbon based sources? I'd prefer renewable or nuclear over organic power :-)

For what it's worth, I got an email from Dyn saying that "because you believed in us and supported this company through your donations, we are continuing to fulfill our promise to you: your service is still free for life."

Then again, I've been using them since 1998, back when they were founded, before they were even public (and back when they were just called DynDNS), and I threw them a little donation back then when I was a student. The email said it was for "our longest and most loyal customers."

I wish some of the free DNS services out there would emulate DynDNS's API. A simple entries in my router's DNS file could point dnydns.org at another domain, but still utilize the built in hardcoded DynDNS functionality.

Afraid is good, the only problem is that you get a minimum TTL of 3600... so, any time your dynamic IP changes, your server is down for up to an hour.

Dyn gave me a TTL of 60 on the free account. I had a VIP membership for a year or two there and I could set it as low as 20. I only did this because I needed a custom domain name.

I eventually figured out that I could just create CNAMES on Afraid (where you can have custom domains for free) pointing to the A records on Dyn to effectively achieve custom DNS with a TTL of 60 ... for free.

I don't necessarily object to paying dyndns. I've been using it for free for ages and it has worked really well.

But from "free" to $25/year? I find that hard to take. If they offered the same service for $10/year I'd have already given them a credit card and forgotten about it. But $25 seems steep for a service they (and others) have managed to offer for free for years.

For what it's worth, I got an email from Dyn saying that "because you believed in us and supported this company through your donations, we are continuing to fulfill our promise to you: your service is still free for life."

Then again, I've been using them since 1998, back when they were founded, before they were even public (and back when they were just called DynDNS), and I threw them a little donation back then when I was a student. The email said it was for "our longest and most loyal customers."

That's pretty classy, I'd say. I can't hate a company for trying to re-evaluate how they intend to earn their revenue, they certainly don't owe me anything for free. And throwing this out to long-time supporters just earns them a little more goodwill in my book.

Don't know where I'll go from here, honestly I probably won't pay for this service (it's just not worth that much to me), but not too mad about it.

For what it's worth, I got an email from Dyn saying that "because you believed in us and supported this company through your donations, we are continuing to fulfill our promise to you: your service is still free for life."

Then again, I've been using them since 1998, back when they were founded, before they were even public (and back when they were just called DynDNS), and I threw them a little donation back then when I was a student. The email said it was for "our longest and most loyal customers."

No-IP is a great alternative free dynamic DNS provider.. We have tons of cool domains to choose from and our service is rock solid. We are also integrated in a lot of routers and hardware devices with lots more to come. https://www.noip.com/blog/2014/04/07/we ... customers/

Wait a minute, look at the bottom of that chart. Isn't any automated service 0% organic? Machines are synthetic... Can't argue about fat free. I always wondered how they made money on this service, now I know they don't.

That bothered my too. My computer is 100% inorganic although I make sure all the electrons are from organic sources.

From carbon based sources? I'd prefer renewable or nuclear over organic power :-)

.... Sometimes I forget the things people on Ars will pick up that no one in RL would. Yes, I was being subtle about being evil and burning things for my electricity. It sounds green but it's really just as black as my fuel.

For those still looking for an alternative service, check http://duckdns.org (not related to duckduckgo) it's a no thrills DDNS service, plus you can log into it with a Reddit account (and Facebook and G+ as well).

Anyway it was a long time coming. First the available domain names got chopped, then number of hosts, then the infamous monthly email. What bothers me though is that I already own a domain, but the provider doesn't offer DDNS.